The tall man socked me across the face and white-hot pain exploded behind my eyes.
The room tilted, my limbs clumsy and slow, and smoke suffocated my lungs.
Through the haze, I still saw everything.
But nothing compared to the pain and grief shredding my insides.
Pools of crimson spread across the white tiles. Sofia kicked and flailed, her eyes bright with fear as the short man carried her out of the apartment.
Dad’s mournful sobs. His body over Mom’s as he begged her not to leave him. Words I didn’t understand. The Association. The Six.
Bang!
Then the horrifying silence.
Black venom invaded my senses. Flames rose, a vicious monster, devouring everything in their path.
My vision flickered. Once. Twice.
Ragged breaths throttled out of me.
A sweet scent drifted to my nose—the melted chocolates in my pocket.
I heard Elise’s laughter and imagined the elm tree in spring as darkness overtook me.
I woke to fire singeing my shoes, the smell of melted plastic corrosive to my nostrils.
And pain, so much pain.
Flames surrounded me, and for a moment, I thought I woke up in hell.
I staggered to my knees.
Mom. Dad. Beatrice and Sofia.
Images of what happened slammed into my mind. My family—I choked as black smoke invaded my nostrils.
But I still crawled toward where I saw them last.
Glass shards dug into my hands. More coughs wrenched out of my lungs. Too much smoke and the scorching heat—it was like my skin was melting off with each inch of forward movement.
And when I looked up, unable to get any closer with the burning furniture in the way, a sob lodged in my throat.
A fiery inferno had unleashed its wrath on everything I knew—four walls of crackling, burning hell. Charred smells reached my nose—the snapping beams and roaring flames warning me to get out.
It was too late for my parents and little Beatrice. Much too late.
Moisture clouded my eyes as I crawled toward the door. If I didn’t reach it before the flames, I’d die too.
And I wanted to. But I couldn’t, because Sofia was out there.
I needed to find her.
Pain scraped my legs as fire climbed my jeans. I rolled, snuffed it out, and dragged myself to the threshold, finally finding the strength to stand. A silver glint on the entryway table, which was still untouched by the flames caught my eye.
My dad’s beloved lighter. I grabbed it.
Something white flapped onto the floor from the table. Feminine scrawl with one word.Kian.
